


...cause you just might get it

by lynnwrites



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - High School, Be Careful What You Wish For, Butt Grading System, First Kiss, Hand Jobs, Jock Derek, Loner Stiles Stilinski, M/M, Nerd Stiles, Pining, Teen Crush, Transformation
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-10
Updated: 2017-12-10
Packaged: 2019-02-13 04:35:07
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 11,430
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12976038
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lynnwrites/pseuds/lynnwrites
Summary: Life can be tough when your name is Stiles Stilinski, your best friend-turned-werewolf is abandoning you for the lacrosse team - leaving you with no other friends - and the guy you've been pining after for over a year is still as unaccessible as ever. In fact, the entire lacrosse team is a giant enigma to Stiles. It's enough to make him go "I wish that I could be a fly on the wall of the boys’ locker room.”It goes about as well as you'd expect.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This is my Secret Santa gift for [beerwolves!](https://beerwolves.tumblr.com/)
> 
> I was very lucky to have such a long list of prompts to choose from! I had a lot of fun writing this, so I hope you enjoy it, too! ^-^
> 
>  
> 
> [Inspired by the book 'Fly On The Wall' by E. Lockhart]

Stiles adds some finishing touches to his drawing as he munches on a french fry. He’s by himself in the cafeteria; ever since Scott ~~was bitten by a werewolf~~ got on the lacrosse team and started having ‘bro-time’ with his teammates, Stiles couldn’t really claim an entire table for just himself. He’s sitting on the floor with his back against a wall, fries on a tray next to him and drawing in his hand.

He sharpens his pencil and accidentally blows some pencil dust into his fries. Eh, whatever, they’ll probably taste fine. His drawing of Superman is looking pretty good, except maybe the butt’s a little too small. He grabs his eraser and intensifies the butt. Unf. Yes. He’ll work on the shading later, and for now settles for some more delicious fries. Shit, he got ketchup on the drawing. He quickly licks it off of Superman’s impressive pecs.

Jackson’s staring at him.

“What are you looking at?” Stiles mutters.

“Nothing.”

“Clever,” he says, sharpening his already sharp pencil.

Jackson’s a dull jock. He has to add the dull part, since there are some nice ones at this school. At least one. Stiles looks at Superman’s butt again and pretends it’s not based on a real life model.

“Why were you licking your Iron Man drawing?” Jackson asks with a mean laugh. “That’s pretty fucked up.”

“Superman.”

“What?”

“It’s clearly a Superman drawing.”

“Whatever, get a life, Stilinski.”

When Jackson walks away, Stiles - and presumably half the cafeteria - hears him say: “Get this, guys: I just caught Stilinski giving oral to some Iron Man drawing he made.”

_it’s fucking superman._

“He would!”

_iron man isn’t even my type. i’d never draw him, let alone give him oral._

Jackson Whittemore and his gang of halfwits think they’re all so great because they’re on top of the social food chain, and fine, maybe that’s the way it is, but Stiles would feel much more comfortable with everything if everybody would just _leave him the fuck alone_. He only has a year and a half left in this shithole and then he can go wherever he wants.

He walks over to his English Lit. class, feeling sort of bad for not doing the reading. For all that Stiles gets dubbed a ‘nerd’ by everyone at this school, he doesn’t actually love studying much. Or at all. Teachers see him around school, usually alone, and instantly decide he’s supposed to be a smart loner kid. Okay, fine, Stiles isn’t dumb. He spends most nights in a vicious wikipedia cycle and before he knows it, the sun’s coming up again. He doesn’t like to do the _assigned_ reading, is the point.

He can’t even concentrate anyway, because during English Lit., Derek Hale sits next to him. Delicious, smart, hot Derek Hale. Messy dark hair that looks like Derek woke up like that, cheekbones that can cut a bitch, and eyes that pierce your fucking soul if you’re not ready for them. Stiles is _never_ ready.

_derek. derek. touch my arm by accident like you did yesterday. notice me._

“Stiles?”

“Huh?”

“Vermin,” Ms. Velasquez repeats. “I asked you to define the word.”

Stiles shrugs. “It’s a bug, right? Like a cockroach?”

“That’s one way of looking at it.” Stiles is already tuning out and staring inconspicuously at Derek’s jaw. _Is he growing stubble? Does Derek shave? Every day?_

“-the translation could mean he’s talking about other animals that have negative connotations, like rats, mice, lice, flies, squirrels.” Ms. Velasquez continues.

Stiles doesn’t have a clue what’s going on. _Derek smells so good._

“Derek?” Ms. Velasquez says, and only then does Stiles notice Derek raised his hand.

“Couldn’t it also mean disgusting people?” he says. “Like people who molest children or, like, murderers; they’re vermin.”

“Absolutely! And sometimes you see it being used as a derogatory term for large groups of people, or for prisoners for example.”

Derek did the reading. He’s just such a good, kind guy. He spends hours running after a ball on a field all week and still finds the time to read Kafka. He’d probably do the reading even if nobody checked.

Class is dismissed and Stiles clears his throat before he loses his nerve.

“Hey, Derek.” His voice squeaks and Stiles is _mortified_.

Derek smiles. _Fuck, he’s gorgeous_. “Yeah?”

“Oh.”

Oh God, Derek’s looking right at him. Was he planning on talking to him? Why did he even open his mouth? Panic! Red alert!

“What- Uh… ‘Til where did we need to read for next class?”

Derek picks up his pencil from the floor and Stiles has a front row seat to watch the strip of skin between his shirt and the top of his jeans. Black boxers. _Sexy_.

“Page sixty. It’s on the board,” he says with another charming smile.

Of course it’s on the board. Of course it is. Smooth.

“Oh right. Thanks.”

_i’m a coward. a spineless, boneless vermin boy._

“See you in gym tomorrow,” Derek says before he leaves the classroom.

-

They play dodgeball, for some godforsaken reason, and Derek hits him twice.

“Do you think it means something?” he asks Scott, best friend and ‘lacrosse-bro’, while they’re changing.

“If we were in sixth grade, maybe,” Scott says, already grinning.

“Okay, what would it mean then?”

“Do you want to hear me say it?” He laughs.

“Yes.”

“It would have meant that he liked you back.”

“I didn’t say _I_ liked him,” he mutters.

“Oh please,” Scott continues, outright laughing now. It’s a good thing Derek is on the complete opposite side of the locker room. “You know how boys would pull girls’ hair to show them they were interested? We’re all way too old for that shit now though, so I don’t think him hitting you with a dodgeball meant anything. Sorry.”

Scott doesn’t like sugarcoating things. Well, either he doesn’t like to, or he doesn’t know how; Stiles still isn’t sure.

“I didn’t say I liked him,” he repeats.

“Oh, don’t give me that.”

“What? I’m analyzing the cruel and particularly complicated sociodynamics of high school dodgeball.”

Scott just lifts his eyebrow.

“Is it that obvious?”

“It’s all over your face, all the time,” Scott says, smirking. “ _Derek, Derek, Derek_.”

Well, great. The blush on his face is gonna take a full hour to go back down.

“He _is_ better than the others,” Stiles says, making sure nobody’s listening in.

Scott gives him the stinkeye. “That’s cold, bro.”

It takes Stiles a minute. “Oh, dude, you know I didn’t include you!”

“Uh-huh.”

“Scott!”

-

That night, he’s eating lasagna with his dad and listening to him talk about the antics at the Station when his dad clears his throat.

“So, your Aunt Christie called today.”

“Oh yeah?”

“She’s having some problems at the house and, with your Uncle Tom out at sea, she asked me to come and help out.”

Stiles doesn’t know them that well, but Aunt Christie is dad’s sister, and he knows Tom’s been away for a while. He nods and eats another bite.

“When are you leaving?” he asks, mouth full.

“This Friday.”

Stiles chokes on his food.

“I wish I could take you with me, kid, but you’ve got school.”

“How long will you be gone?”

His dad shrugs. “A week, maybe? Something like that. I wouldn’t leave you alone for too long, though. I know you better than that.” He winks.

Shitdamn. A whole week by himself. Maybe he can ask Scott to come over for a sleepover where they game and eat snacks all night, like they used to all the time. It’s been awhile since they’ve spent time together outside of school, since Scott always has practice or a shift at the vet’s office.

-

Stiles is sketching out one of ~~Batman’s~~ a random man’s legs when Derek and Jackson, of all people, join him at his bench outside. Jackson looks bored and starts scrolling on his phone, but Derek looks over at his sketchpad.

“Naked man, huh?”

Stiles tries to mask the sound of him choking on his own tongue. “Yep, my specialty.”

Derek grins.

“Is that the assignment for art class?”

Stiles always tries his best to ignore the fact that Derek is even in his art class. It’s one thing for him not to hear a word Ms. Velasquez says during English Lit., but he can’t catch up on art class at home, he needs to actually pay attention. AKA he needs to _not_ stare at Derek for an hour.

Stiles nods and closes his sketchpad before Derek gets the wild idea to ask if he can check out what else he’s done.

“Lydia’s looked pretty good, too.”

“Lydia always looks good,” Jackson says, smirking.

“I meant the drawing, you vermin.”

_derek remembers vermin too._

Jackson looks bored again. “Can we go now?”

Derek pulls a face but stands anyway. “See you later, Stiles.”

_i just had a conversation with derek. and i didn’t die._

-

On Thursday, Derek walks up to him in the hallway. Stiles checks behind him twice to make sure he’s the intended target.

“Hey Stiles,” he says.

 _don’t squeak, don’t squeak, don’t squeak._ “...Hi.”

“What’s up?” Derek asks.

“Oh, you know, the usual. Random acts of violence, media saturation, teenage angst, utter mayhem.”

_what the fuck am i even saying._

Derek laughs. At Stiles’ joke. Derek laughed at Stiles’ bad joke.

“So, uh… I wanted to talk to you about uh… Something that Jackson said.”

Jackson. What would Jackson have to say- oh no. The locker room. Stiles checked if Derek was far enough away but maybe Jackson heard him talk about Derek? He heard enough to mention Stiles to Derek behind his back.

“Wait! Before you go on, I just wanna say that whatever Jackson has to say about me is a total lie.” He laughs in what is hopefully a non-crazy sounding tone. “He’s an idiot.”

“Uh…” Derek hesitates. “Okay, but he-”

“No, promise me you won’t believe a word he said.” Stiles is panicking. Obviously.

“Oh, come on, he’s not that bad. He’s actually really nice once you get to know him.”

“Shit, you two are friends, right?”

Derek pulls a face. “I mean, I guess? We’ve known each other since we were little kids, so…”

The bell rings and echoes throughout the halls. “Uh... ,” Stiles mumbles. “I’m sorry for being rude. I’m sure Jackson’s a nice friend to you-”

“Hey, listen, I gotta go,” Derek says, and Stiles can’t read his face. “I’ll talk to you later, Stiles.”

_well, shit. excellent trash talking of his childhood friend, you idiot. and now i don’t even know what jackson said about me. maybe he told derek about me licking the drawing. nah, the whole school heard about that already. maybe it was just about how much of a freak i am._

-

Dad leaves early on Friday morning, and Stiles is only half awake when he hugs him goodbye, promising to look after himself and the house, as long as Dad promises to send Aunt Christie and the kids his love.

After a brief nap on the couch, he gets ready for school. His car refuses to start and Stiles is too tired to even open the hood up, so he runs to catch the bus. He missed the official school bus, but this town one doesn’t stop too far away, he can just walk the rest of the way.

He’s settled into his seat when at the next stop, an old man in ratty clothes gets on and stumbles into Stiles’ lap when the bus starts moving again. Stiles helps him into the seat next to him and smiles kindly.

“Are you in high school, kid?” the old man asks.

Stiles nods and mentally debates if he should get his ipod out.

“I used to think I’d be young forever.”

_oh god no. please. i just want to ride the bus in silence. why me?_

“And now here I am,” he continues as if Stiles is remotely interested, “my legs don’t work like they used to, my eyes don’t work like they used to, hell, I’m lucky my ears are still going strong.”

Stiles nods politely and hopes that’s the end of it.

“You think you’ll be like his forever, but you’ll change before you know it,” he says. “You’ll change before you know it.”

_ooooookaaaayyyy. a little weird._

“I’d love to change. Being sixteen is awful.”

“Oh no, young man. It’s a treasure. You should treasure it.”

-

He finally steps off the bus, happy to be free of the kind, yet disturbingly weird old man. He rounds the corner on the school block and walks directly in a weird, white, gunky puddle.

 _that’s the most disgusting thing i’ve ever seen, and i saw scott through his wolfy maneuvers. it splashed back against the back of his legs, and_ of course _he wore shorts today. is it starting to burn? is this shit poisonous?_

He searches through his bag for a tissue and wipes the most likely radioactive gunk off.

_ew again. just...ew._

He just manages to make it to his first class on time, and on Fridays, that means...art. With Derek. And, you know, all his other classmates. Of which Derek is one.

Mr. Yee is talking about Lydia’s drawing and even though Stiles agrees objectively that it’s nice, his head is just not in the game today. He gets distracted when a fly buzzes right by him. He tracks it as it flies up against the blackboard, has a little break _on Stiles’ drawing_ , then whizzes off to the light bulb.

_poor little guy._

Stiles stands up before he even thinks about it and grabs one of the plastic cups from the desk. He finds where the fly is (on the table next to Derek’s hand) and places the cup over top of it, then scoots a piece of paper underneath so he can safely transport it to the window.

“Are you quite done, Mr. Stilinski? I’d like to start critiquing your piece,” Mr. Yee says.

Stiles stays still just to make sure the fly made it outside, and didn’t accidentally try to _mate_ with his drawing again, then turns around with an embarrassed grin. “All done.”

_how do flies even mate? is it with eggs?_

“All right, well, I appreciate you trying to stray away from your stylized lines and comic influence-”

Of course Mr. Yee appreciates it. He’s been mentioning how ugly he thinks Stiles’ lines were for every assignment this entire year.

Stiles tunes out when Mr. Yee moves on to the next drawing.

_god, i’m so fucking tired today._

-

Scott meets him by his locker at the end of the day, right before his lacrosse practice.

“Ugh, I’m gonna be busy all weekend,” Scott says. “I’m covering a shift on Saturday and Jackson wants us doing extra practice on Sunday.”

Stiles scrunches his nose in disgust. “Ew.”

Scott nods. It looks like Stiles is gonna spend his entire weekend alone after all.

“How about tonight? We could hangout, game a little?”

Scott pulls an apologetic face. “Sorry, dude. I’ve got dinner with my dad planned.”

_scott hates his dad. normally he’d jump at the opportunity to brush him off. is scott hiding something from me?_

“So you won’t have any free time this weekend?” Stiles tries so hard not to sound whiney.

“Sorry, bro.” _bro?_ “Hey, but maybe next week, alright?”

“Right.” Stiles fakes a smile.

Someone knocks him in the shoulder when they pass by, and then Stiles watches as the popular kids all make their way over to the locker room and the field. It was probably Jackson, and now his goddamn shoulder hurts. Allison waves as she walks by, and Lydia ignores them, of course. Derek is talking to Isaac and Boyd, who’s got Erica on his arm.

Scott will probably have to go and join them soon. Stiles rolls his eyes.

“They’re all so weird.”

“Pff… You’re weird.”

Stiles shrugs. “It just feels like… I don’t know, we’re two entirely different species. I don’t get them.”

“You know I’m one of them?” Scott reminds him.

“Well yeah, but don’t you know what I mean?”

Scott laughs. “Not really.”

An idea pops into his head.

“Hey, do you know what I wish?”

“That you had a life?” Scott says, distracted by his phone.

“Scott!”

“Okay. That Derek liked you.”

Stiles blushes. “Besides that.”

“Money? Beauty?”

“Besides those.”

“Peace?”

“Besides that.”

Scott sighs. “What do you wish, Stiles?”

“I wish,” Stiles says, “that I could be a fly on the wall of the boys’ locker room.”

“Stiles, you’re a boy. You’ve been there.”

“No, I’ve been in a corner, hiding and minding my own business. I wanna be a fly on the wall and see what the popular kids talk about, you know?”

“Uhu.” Scott is just humoring him now.

“Go to practice, you no good punk,” Stiles laughs and pushes Scott away.

He goes home. He orders a pizza and eats half of it in the span of five minutes. He drags himself up the stairs and into his bed. He falls asleep.


	2. Chapter 2

It’s Saturday morning, and Stiles wakes with a yawn. His body is fatigued, so he stretches his arms and then his legs, and then his  _ other legs _ .

Other legs?

_ when did i get extra legs? they’re kind of itchy. i’ll rub them together. i must still be asleep, and this is just a weird dream. _

_ maybe i ate something funky and it’s affecting my dreams. i ordered from a new pizza place, so maybe that’s why. i’ll probably wake up for real in a minute. _

_ i kind of want to stretch something else though. what is it? hmm.  _

_ oh yes, my wings. my WINGS! _

He stretches them and they feel amazing coming out of his shoulders. He feels an urge to flap them up and down, but he can’t just do that, can he? This doesn’t feel like a dream at all.

Finally, he decides to open his eyes. Or well, not open exactly. He becomes aware of his surroundings, and is hit by visuals from all sides. He doesn’t just see what’s in front of him; he can see above, below, front and back, to the side of him. It doesn’t even confuse him, he can focus on all of them separately. What the shit is going on here.

In front of him is a giant window, and he can’t fight the urge to start climbing it. He crawls all the way to the top, like it’s no big deal and gravity  _ isn’t  _ making him its bitch. He’s motherfucking spiderman. flyman?  _ vermin _ .

He finally takes a look at where he is, and it all looks oddly familiar. The window looks out onto a field, and behind him are showers. There are lockers, and benches, and an amazing smell of mould coming from the ceiling cracks.

It’s a locker room. It’s  _ his  _ locker room. The Beacon Hills High School locker room. Holy hell.

_ i actually did it. i’m a fucking fly in the locker room. i’m gonna… i’m gonna have a panic attack. _

-

It’s a few hours later and Stiles decides to take his wings out for a spin. He feels like a goddamn superhero and, if you ignore the part where he almost flew into a spiderweb and got eaten, he’s not that bad at the job. The only problem is that he’s a fly 24/7 apparently. He can’t really do much.

He tries to escape the locker room, but he can’t get through the vents, and the door has a rubber seal on the bottom so he can’t even sneak underneath. The window doesn’t open, not even for human!Stiles, so it seems he’ll be spending the weekend here.

Stiles is pent up with anxiety, and just starts flying. And flying. And flying.

Saturday turns into Sunday, and then Stiles bores his way to Monday morning when he’ll finally have some human contact.

-

Monday.

The door to the locker room slams open and Stiles wakes from his not!sleep. Someone’s here!

It’s a senior - Josh, Stiles thinks he’s called - who walks over to one of the lockers, takes out his gym clothes and  _ drops his pants _ . Suddenly Stiles is faced with a naked butt and no option to look away. That’s Josh’s butt, right there.

Josh turns around to look for something in his bag, and yep, that’s his penis. Oh dear God, it’s the only penis besides his own Stiles has ever seen and it’s senior Josh’s. He’ll never be able to look him in the face now. Not that he ever did, seniors are scary. 

It looks...actually pretty similar to Stiles’ own, which means that’s one less panic attack to have. His penis isn’t an abnormal size or shape. It distracts him for a little while until he realizes pretty soon he’ll be seeing everybody’s butts and penises! Peni? A bunch of dicks!

_ holy shit. _

He flies over to have a closer look, and while the penis is moderately impressive, it’s his butt that Stiles has a weak spot for.

_ it’s nice and round and plump. ugh. i bet you could bounce a quarter on it.  _

Josh pulls up a jockstrap and his gym shorts and Stiles tries not to be too disappointed that the naked butt show is over. He appreciates the jockstrap, though.

The seniors always look annoyingly handsome, but Josh has some zits across his shoulders and back, and his belly hangs over the top of his shorts when he leans down. He’s not as perfect as Stiles always assumed he was.

Josh pulls on a shirt and the door slams open again. Stiles has no idea why the door needs to be slammed every time, not a single person seems to want to open it gently. A group of senior guys walk in and start changing for gym class.

There are hairy guys and hairless guys, guys who just take off their shirts and guys who walk around naked, guys with scars, guys with hairy backs, guys who shave their legs.

Dicks. A whole bunch of dicks.

Stiles has seen his fair share of pornography, and he knows those dicks shouldn’t be the standard, but there are a few surprising whoppers in this group. And then there’s someone like Shane, who looks like he would have a big dick (don’t ask Stiles why, he just  _ does _ ), but actually has a relatively small one. 

Tired of looking at shriveled, flaccid penises; Stiles moves on to check out some booties. Once again, there are hairy and hairless booties, and some that definitely look waxed compared to the furry legs underneath.

A whistle blows in the gym, and the guys leave the locker room. Stiles suddenly realizes this means he can  _ leave _ , and he flies fast to get to the door. It’s difficult, trying to get through with the guys walking underneath him. He tries sitting on someone’s shoulder and immediately falls off and almost gets stepped on. The whole situation is so stressful, he flies back to his trusty corner and calms down from the anxiety.

When the guys come back from gym, Stiles makes a half-hearted effort to spy on them in the shower, but honestly it bores him a little. The guys are just washing up before the rest of their classes, and nothing eventful happens.

-

The same thing happens a few more times throughout the day. A group of guys walk in, Stiles checks out the dicks and butts while they change, Stiles has a heart attack trying to fly outside and eventually waits it out. Life inside a locker room is pretty fucking boring.

The school bell rings and a few minutes later, Derek walks into the room.

_ derek! _

_ how did i forget about this! derek is going to be naked right in front of me. i’m not ready. i feel dirty for doing this. it didn’t feel like this with all of the other guys. _

Before Stiles knows it, Derek has walked over to his locker and quickly shrugs out of his shirt to pull on a new one. He seems skittish and stressed until he steps out of his jeans and into his gym shorts. He sits down on the bench with a relieved smile and starts to put on his sneakers when the rest of the lacrosse team walks in.

_ oh jesus. i’m gonna be seeing everybody naked. alright. i can do this. i’ve seen several peens today, a few more can’t hurt. _

_ oh gOD NO SCOTT IS CHANGING. LOOK AWAY FROM SCOTT. FUCK! MY EYES DON’T CLOSE! FOCUS ON SOMEONE ELSE. _

There’s Danny. Danny’s a nice guy. Arguably one of the least problematic ones in this bunch. Stiles flies a little closer to admire the view, but not so close he can be swatted to death.

_ danny has hella abs. how is he so beefy? we’re in high school, this is fucking unfair.  _

Next to him, Jackson is changing. Stiles quickly moves on to Boyd and Isaac, since everybody’s changing at a rapid pace, and he couldn’t give two shits about Jackson, actually.

When Boyd is ready, Derek drags him outside, and Jackson and Danny quickly follow. The rest of the team have been changing on the other side of the room and frankly Stiles is too busy to care.

Scott is still working on his shoelaces, and Isaac stays behind and wrings his hands nervously.

“What’s up?” Scott asks.

“Oh,” Isaac laughs nervously. “Uh… If Coach makes us pair up for anything, do you wanna train with me?”

“Sure, of course!” Scott smiles that special Scott smile and Isaac blushes when Scott starts working on his shoelaces again. That’s...something new.

Eventually Scott’s shoes cooperate and they run outside, and then Stiles is alone in the room again. He wants to snoop in people’s stuff but A) that’s kind of creepy and B) he’s a fucking fly. Why did he even wish for this?

About an hour and a half later, the team drags their asses inside again, looking a little muddier and grassier. Everybody strips down to go take a shower, and Stiles is back in creep-mode.

Derek showers so fast, Stiles almost misses him doing it. A quick soap and rinse and he’s back at his locker, towel around his waist while he pulls up his underwear. He’s a lot leaner than he looks with clothes on. He usually wears semi-loose shirts, and Stiles knows he’s got some good muscle definition in his arms. Derek doesn’t look bad, of course, but he looks like he’s hiding himself, and Stiles doesn’t have a clue why. Once Derek is finished dressing, he looks relieved.

The other guys join him at the lockers and start changing too.

“Hey, who wants to go watch a movie tonight?” Derek asks, acting like his normal, confident self again.

Boyd and Isaac nod before Danny says, “I don’t get my paycheck ‘til next week. Can’t we watch a movie at your house?”

“Yeah.” Scott looks up from his phone. “Plus they’re not playing anything exciting right now.”

“The new Spiderman’s playing,” Derek suggests.

_ first of all, derek wants to go see spiderman. oh my god. second of all, scott don’t you dare do this to me. _

Scott shakes his head. “Can’t, Stiles asked me to see it with him.”

_ thank fucking god. our friendship was almost cancelled. _

“Also hi, I’m still broke,” Danny says.

Derek seems to have a silent conversation with Jackson. In fact, Isaac and Boyd also seem in on this private conversation.

“Alright, alright,” Jackson claps Danny on the back. “I‘ll buy your ticket, you cheapskate.”

“I don’t get it, though,” Scott says. “Derek’s family got this big house out in the woods, why can’t we go there?”

Derek does something with his eyes to Isaac, who - for some reason - understands it and steps in.

“Listen, how about you pick the movie, huh?” he says.

Scott seems pleased with that, and Derek seems to sigh in relief.

“Alright, let’s go then, slowpokes!” Derek laughs, and Stiles ignores the weirdness of what just happened so he can look into Derek’s eyes real close.

Jackson tries to swat him away and Stiles nearly flies into a locker, but it was worth it.

It must be nice, though. Having a friend group so large you can all just hang out and do stuff together. If someone cancels on you, there are other people you can call. So maybe Stiles is a little jealous. And maybe this isn’t the first time he’s thought about this.

-

Tuesday.

After what Stiles has started calling sleep, but is really a sort of offline modus, the locker room door smashes open again; and in walks a new batch of students Stiles can inspect.

He doesn’t even feel like flying closer, though. In fact, the excitement is almost completely gone. There’s nothing surprising or new to be discovered. Stiles is now well-versed in dicks and butts. It’s kind of boring actually. They’re just bodies. They’re just people.

Instead, he starts to think.

_ how the fuck did this happen to me? i get that my wildly specific wish led me here, but how? there was the fly i saved in art class, but that doesn’t seem special enough to warrant me a wish… was it the radioactive gunk on my leg? maybe i’ll die here. i haven’t actually eaten anything since i woke up yesterday. or maybe it was that weird old guy on the bus. what did he say again? ‘you’ll change before you know it.’ fucking hell. i’ve been cursed. ok fine, i asked for this. but i feel cursed. _

All Stiles knows is that he’s stuck for now. And bored. Unbelievably bored. So bored in fact, that he decides to start grading the butts. As far as Stiles has been able to tell, there are no  _ bad  _ butts, there are just better butts than others.

_ grade ‘A+’ butts: plump. thick. juicy. exactly like you’d wanna bite it, or just like, rest your head on it. comfy, yet firm. a superhero butt. very rare on high school dudes. _

_ grade ‘A’ butts: small. flatter than the ‘A+’ one of course, but not so flat that you’d wonder where his back ended and the booty began. a little plump. _

_ grade ‘A-’ butts: tiny. shockingly tiny compared to the rest of the body. cute. usually very built athletic types. _

_ grade ‘B+’ butts: flat. soft-looking. boring. it’s just...there. _

_ grade ‘B’ butts: big. soft. a little chubby. squeezable. a nice handful. _

_ grade ‘B-’ butts: the common ‘B’ butt except hairy. or with pimples. _

_ grade ‘C’ butts: everything else. stretchmarks. really hairy. lumpy. _

_ grade ‘D’ butts: not a thing. _

A lot of guys with beautiful faces turn out to have a ‘C’ butt; and sometimes the most boring looking people have the nicest asses.

So maybe the system’s a little degrading, but it passes the time. Stiles spends the rest of the day judging people on their ass - since they don’t have anything interesting to say - until the lacrosse team walks in.

Scott almost walks into a locker when he doesn’t look up from his phone, and he seems to be texting someone with a giant smile on his face. Is this why he’s always busy? Stiles wonders what Scott thinks about him being gone.

_ derek is taking his shirt off. i can’t think about anything else. _

_ derek. derek. derek. god, he’s just so beautiful. i wanna draw him so bad. just like this. i wish i could capture this moment, but i can’t. because i’m a fly. and i’m stuck in a  _ fucking  _ locker room. _

Just like yesterday, Derek hurries to change outfits, and Stiles has a quick glimpse at his butt just so he can determine where he falls on the scale. It’s a solid ‘A’.

In terms of the others; Boyd has an absolute ‘A+’ butt, there’s no doubt about it. Stiles is loathe to admit it, but Jackson has a nice ‘A’ butt, too; as does Danny, which is less hard to acknowledge. Isaac’s is a ‘B+’, and Stiles is not even gonna try to look at Scott, that’ll only cause him nightmares. Well, when he gets to sleep normally again, it’ll cause him nightmares.

After they get back from practice, and have all taken a shower, they prepare to leave. Derek seems to be stalling, rummaging through his locker, waiting for everyone else to go. Jackson’s the last one to leave after casting a worried look in his direction, but eventually he lets the door close behind him too.

Derek scratches his neck and walks over to the mirrors. After a few seconds of ignoring his own reflection, he lifts up his shirt a little. He winces slightly and rubs his stomach before raising the shirt higher and inspecting his chest.

Derek sighs and turns to the side, glares at his body in the mirror before dropping his shirt again. He looks at the floor, clears his throat and grabs his stuff, then leaves.

Stiles isn’t sure what Derek sees when he looks at himself, but he obviously doesn’t like it. It’s odd, knowing how he’s been lusting after Derek while Derek doesn’t seem to like his own body. He hides his feelings really well, Stiles thinks. Whenever Stiles sees him, he’s confident, funny, social; he’s relaxed and comfortable. Until he takes his clothes off, and then he shrinks into himself.

Stiles wonders if Derek’s ever had a girlfriend. Stiles has never seen him with anybody, and most people on the team are high in demand around the school. Jackson’s with Lydia, Boyd and Erica are dating, so are Danny and Ethan…but Derek just looked sad. And Stiles wishes he could help him.

-

Wednesday.

Stiles spends the entire night hoping, wishing, praying he would wake up as himself, but once again he’s woken by the door to the locker room slamming open, and Stiles sighs internally. No such luck.

The person who opened the door is a surprise, however. Isaac walks over to one of the benches with a paper cup full of what Stiles assumes to be coffee and takes a seat. After rummaging in his bag and taking out some stuff, he finds what he’s looking for and starts to read. Stiles can’t hold back his curiosity and flies over to the bench as subtly as he can to start snooping. One of Isaac’s notebooks sticks out from his bag and Stiles can read some of the scribbles on the first page. Everybody’s name pops up a few times, but Scott seems to be the main interest, and Stiles finally realizes what’s going on. Isaac has a crush on Scott. 

But why is he in here? Stiles has been here for over four days now, and he has no idea why someone would  _ voluntarily  _ stay in the locker room when there’s plenty of space around the school. And isn’t he friends with all the jocks? Unless something happened that Stiles doesn’t know about, but Isaac looks okay. In fact, he looks quite relaxed.

The first bell rings and Isaac packs up his stuff and leaves, dutifully dumping his coffee cup in the trash. Stiles is thirsty (he thinks), so he flies over and has a sip of the leftovers. It’s a little messed up how good the trash can smells, though.

The caffeine makes him hyper, and he spends most of the day flying in circles - carefully avoiding the spider-corner - until the last bell rings and the lacrosse team walks in.

Stiles isn’t really paying attention until he hears his own name.

“Hey McCall”, Jackson says, stepping closer to Scott, “I haven’t seen Stilinski around much this week.”

Derek looks up from where he’s changing.

“Yeah, so?” Scott asks, and Stiles braces himself for whatever shitty remark Jackson’s about to make.

“Is he okay?”

_ holy shit. _

Scott nods. “I think so. I mean, I don’t know, I haven’t heard from him. I tried texting him a couple times but I think his phone’s dead, he never charges it. Maybe he’s sick or something.”

Stiles doesn’t miss how Derek is eavesdropping - mainly because he forgot to pull his shirt on and Stiles is enjoying the view. 

Scott’s right, though, Stiles always forgets to charge his phone; and it explains why nobody is panicking about Stiles’ absence. No one’s missing him, exactly. Except Jackson, apparently. And maybe Derek, too.

“Why do you care, aren’t you dating Lydia?” Scott jokes.

“No,” Jackson says easily. “Lydia’s dating Cora, Derek’s sister.” He glances over to where Danny’s changing. “I’m not dating anybody.”

Scott’s already distracted by his phone, and pretty soon they all walk out the door.

When they come back from practice, Jackson, Derek, Boyd and Isaac stay behind.

Stiles settles on top of one of the lockers so he can listen in.

“When are we meeting on Friday?” Isaac asks.

“Depends on whether you like homemade lasagna,” Derek says, smirking. “Mom’s already preparing the meal and she fully expects everybody there so if you value your life and don’t want your throat ripped out, you’ll come at seven on the dot.”

“Seriously, like we could resist a Talia-special,” Jackson says and Stiles is definitely missing something.

“You know we won’t miss a pack-night,” Boyd claps Derek on the shoulder. Stiles has almost got it figured out.

“You’ll bring Erica, right?”

“‘Course.”

“On time, this time?”

“Hey, don’t hold last month over me, she was doing her make up and you know I can’t interfere with that.”

They laugh as they leave the room and Stiles finally catches on.

_ ripping throats out. pack. last month. friday night...is the full moon. holy fuckin shitballs, they’re all werewolves. _

_!!! they’re all! werewolves! scott you absolute buffoon how did you not smell them?! how have they not smelled you?! is the stench in the locker room  _ that bad _ that it covers werewolf smells? _

_ wait. werewolves hear better. they’ve been hearing my careful whispers and whining the entire goddamn time? FUCK. _

Stiles flies into a wall.

The unconsciousness doesn’t last as long as he had hoped, so he does it again. And then again.

_ oh god. please help. someone get me the hell out of here. _

-

Thursday.

New people come in for gym. Stiles grades their butts. He feasts on a few crumbs that fell underneath the benches. He watches as two seniors walk in during class, step into one of the toilet stalls and start making out. Ten minutes later, they both leave like it didn’t just happen.

If Stiles was a Real Boy, he’d have his hands down his pants right now.

_ oh god. jerking off. how long has it been since i jerked off. at least… a week. that’s a new record. does it count if i don’t have a penis  _ to  _ jerk off? yes it does.  _

As he watches yet another group of guys change, he starts to reflect. Stiles used to think everybody was so unattainable. Like he was the shit at the bottom of someone else’s shoe, while other people got to rule the school.

But everything’s a façade. Everybody’s got a mask on, whether they do it on purpose or not. When you strip everything down, when you literally look at everybody naked, it’s clear how nobody’s perfect.

Someone could have a great personality, but gets ignored because there’s acne on their face. You could have a gorgeous ass in jeans, but when you take away the pants, it’s covered in hair or pimples. Some guys with amazing abs have a tiny penis, and for some people - Stiles is sure - the tiny penis is the reason they worked on having amazing abs. You could think you’re the hottest shit, but being vain will drive people away. Stiles loves the way Derek looks, but it’s very clear Derek has a terrible image of his own body.

Beauty is subjective, and you can’t hold people to a perfect standard because no one will be able to reach it.

It’s last period when Scott walks in laughing with a giggling Allison on his arm.

_ OH. that’s why scott’s been busy. he has a girlfriend. why didn’t he tell me? _

They laugh and whisper and start making out against a locker.

_ really, though, scott? the locker room? i have it on good authority that it smells disgusting in here. _

They break apart and Allison asks, “So, do you wanna go to the Winter Formal with me?”

Stiles mentally high-fives Scott.

“Oh, uh…” Scott hesitates and Stiles mentally puts his hand down. “I don’t know, Alli.”

_ why not? _

“Why not?” Allison asks. “Is this about Stiles?”

_ wow, what do i have to do with this? _

Scott looks sheepish. “You know he won’t take it well.”

_ what? _

“Scott, come on. What’s the problem? Does he hate me or something?”

_ no! _

Scott stays silent. Allison looks disappointed.

“He doesn’t  _ know  _ you,” he eventually says. “He doesn’t know anybody on the team and in our friend group.”

“So, introduce me! Introduce us! Why are you so afraid of what he’ll do?”

“I’m not afraid, it’s just… I’m all he has.”

Stiles’ tiny fly-heart hurts. He wishes what Scott was saying wasn’t true. He had no idea he was leaning on Scott so heavily, so much so that he didn’t feel comfortable involving Stiles with his other friends. Stiles must have been horrible about them, if this is what Scott thinks.

“I’m sick of sneaking around, Scott.”

“I know, I’m just- Don’t ask me to do this.”

Allison sighs. “I’m asking you, Scott. Make a decision.” She clears her throat. “I gotta go to class, I’ll see you later, okay.”

Scott sits there, like a statue, until the rest of the team walks in and he starts getting ready for practice.

When they’re showering and dressing and joking around, Stiles finally fully realizes how wrong he’s been all this time. About all of them.

He thought Scott was abandoning him, when really, he was protecting Stiles’ feelings. Boyd seemed scary and intimidating, and while he’s still intimidating, the twinkle in his eye when he mentions Erica, and the gentle teasing from the other guys have made him look like a giant teddy bear to Stiles. Isaac always seemed to be part of the in-crowd, and maybe he still is, but he also likes to be alone sometimes (and has a secret crush on Scott). Jackson isn’t a giant asshole or a jock cliché. His perfect girlfriend turned out to be another girl’s perfect girlfriend, and he was the first person to even mention Stiles at all, because he was worried about him. Derek looked like he was calling all the shots, the confident leader of the group, but he’s shy and reserved, and insecure.

Stiles wants to know all of them better, because they seem like amazing people.

-

Friday.

The day has been so utterly boring, Stiles considered flying into the spiderweb on several occasions just to get some excitement in his life. Is this how it ends for him? He makes one tiny, stupid wish and he’s stuck as a fucking fly forever? Stiles is a nice person, okay,  _ he doesn’t deserve this _ .

The lacrosse team seems energized, happy that the weekend is almost here, apart from Scott who’s sulking - and for once, not on his phone.

Derek and Isaac walk in with ice cream and Stiles is salivating. Because of the ice cream, of course. Everything seems fine until Danny and Jackson walk in, slamming doors and kicking lockers.

“I don’t understand why you couldn’t do that shit anywhere else!” Jackson shouts.

Danny snorts. “I never figured you for a homophobe, Jackson.”

“I’m not! You fucking know I’m not!”

“Then what’s the big deal?!”

“Don’t do it in front of my locker! The size of this school, I’d assume you can find  _ any  _ other spot to start swapping spit with  _ him- _ ”

“Remind me how you’re not a homophobe, please.”

“Fuck you, Danny!” Jackson slams Danny into one of the lockers and walks over to the sinks to calm down. The rest of the room is eerily quiet, like nobody knows what to do. Stiles understands, he wouldn’t either. Jackson and Danny have been best friends for years, they grew up together.

“You fucking wish, Whittemore!” Danny changes quickly and leaves the room. Jackson makes a choked sound but refuses to look up until almost everyone’s gone.

Derek’s been waiting too, and when they’re alone he walks over and quickly pecks Jackson on the cheek.

Jackson snorts and Derek giggles.  _ Giggles _ .

“C’mon,” Derek says, pulling Jackson by the arm. “We’ll talk about it later, but Finnstock will have our asses if we’re late.”

Jackson lets himself be dragged off and snorts again when Derek winks at him playfully.

After practice, Danny is the first to leave. He doesn’t talk to anybody, just changes out of his practice gear and walks away, answering his phone with a ‘Hey babe.’

After another one of those silent conversations with their eyes, Boyd and Isaac convince Scott to go outside with them while Derek and Jackson stay behind.

It’s quiet again, and Stiles is buzzing (hah!) to find out what’s going on.

“So,” Derek starts after clearing his throat. “You wanna tell me what happened?”

Jackson’s uncharacteristically quiet. “They were making out against my locker.”

“Who were?”

Jackson raises an eyebrow. “Seriously?”

Derek nods with a kind smile.

“Danny and Ethan. Obviously.”

“And you got jealous.” It’s not a question.

Jackson doesn’t seem surprised to be discovered, though. “Yeah.”

“Of who?”

This makes Jackson look up in shock.

“I’m not an idiot, Jackson.”

“I know that,” Jackson sulks.

“So, who are you jealous of?” Derek bumps his shoulder. “Say it out loud,” he adds in a funny voice.

Jackson smiles and shrugs. “Both, I guess.” He bites his lip.

“That’s okay,” Derek says. “That’s a normal thing to feel.”

“Yeah, but it’s not very realistic, is it?”

“Why not?”

“Because!” Jackson shouts before adjusting his voice again. “I can’t very well walk up to them and go ‘Hey I want in on this deal’ and expect everything to work out okay.”

“I wouldn’t phrase it like that, no, but… I don’t think it’s as unlikely as you think it is.” Derek sighs. “But it’s not gonna happen if you start fighting when he doesn’t even know what you’re really fighting about.”

Jackson deflates. “I know.”

“Just… Try and talk to him. See how the conversation goes. You’ve been friends for like ten years, you’ll work something out.”

“I suppose I should, uh…tell him about the wolf thing too, huh?” He whispers the last words, even though they’re alone in the locker room. (Or so they think.) 

“Talia told you it was your choice if you told him, and you know the pack’s got your back.” Derek claps him on the shoulder. “It’s up to you.”

“Thanks, Derek.”

“Anytime.”

They hug it out, and Stiles is filled with love for both of them, and he hopes everything will work out between Jackson, Danny and Ethan.

“It’s a bit ironic, you giving me relationship advice when you’re still pining after St-”

“Tut-tut-tut!” Derek smacks his hand over Jackson’s mouth, and Stiles is on the edge of his seat as they walk out, presumably on their way to have homemade lasagna.

_ derek’s pining after someone? a st- someone? i’m a st- someone.  _

Stiles brain feels like it’s being fried, it’s way too small to handle all of this information! He can’t think on it for too long, because a few minutes later Scott walks back in. He looks like he’s trying very hard not to cry.

Stiles flies closer so he can see what Scott’s typing on his phone.

‘Alli, please think about this’

He erases the message and starts over.

‘I think you’re being unfair’

This one gets erased even quicker.

‘Please give me another chance’

Scott starts to cry.

_ i want my body back. i want to stop being a fucking fly, i want to be stiles stilinski again, human pest. _

_ not just for the obvious reasons like kissing derek and drawing superman and eating fries way too fast and taking a shower and hearing my dad’s voice. _

_ i want to help scott. i can fix this. i, stiles stilinski, human vermin, can fix this for them. _

_ scott was right that i wouldn’t have reacted well to this a week ago. i didn’t know any of them, never wanted to know any of them. as it turns out, none of them suck as bad as i thought. actually none of them suck at all. i’d be lucky to know them. _

_ i’m happy for scott and allison. he shouldn’t choose me over her. he shouldn’t have to choose at all. _

_ i’ll never be a superhero, but in this moment, i can make two people happy, if only i was back in my body where i belong. _


	3. Chapter 3

After another dreamless night, Stiles wakes up in his bed. In  _ his bed _ . His messy bed that’s half covered in clothes, a quarter covered in cookie crumbs, and a quarter covered with Stiles’ body. His  _ human  _ body.

He stretches out his arms towards the ceiling and stares in amazement at them, and then at his hands (they have opposable thumbs!). He plants his hands over his face and rubs until it all feels real. He jumps up and runs to the bathroom to look at himself in the mirror.

_ it’s really me! i‘m back! that’s my face! that’s my chest! let me just check...yes that is my ass!  _

The first thing he does is locate his phone and plug it in. As it boots up, a bunch of messages and missed calls show up, and Stiles is hit with a pang of sadness and relief at the same time. People missed him.

Which prompts the next question: how will he explain this? He’s been out for a full week, but nobody came to the house, so that helps. Scott’s guess of Stiles being sick inspires Stiles to drive to the drugstore (after both a much-needed shower and jerk-off session), buy tons of tissues and two bottles of cold medicine. On the way home he stops to buy some takeout since he hasn’t eaten much at all this week besides some crumbs.

After he scarfs that down, he starts working on his alibi. He pours one of the bottles of medicine down the drain and leaves the sticky bottle on the counter. The other one goes on his nightstand, along with one of the opened tissue boxes. The other tissues get crumpled and spread around his room, the bathroom and the garbage can in the kitchen. He fills a few glasses with an inch of tap water and leaves those around the house too.

His phone is now charged enough to check out his messages.  Dad left a few voice mails but the reception seems really bad and he gets cut off a lot. He’ll be here tomorrow, so Stiles doesn’t worry about sending him a reply back.

He has a bunch of texts from Scott - at least one for every day he was gone - raising in worry levels as the week went on. There’s no point in waiting any longer, and Stiles has missed him, so he presses ’call’ and waits.

“Stiles!”

Stiles clears his throat and can’t help but smile when he hears his own voice; he hated not being able to talk. “Hey, Scott.”

“Holy shit, dude, where have you been?”

“Oh man, I had the worst cold,” he lies. “Green snot flying everywhere.”

“Gross.”

“Yeah. So uh… That’s why I haven’t called you before now, I pretty much didn’t have a voice, and may or may not have forgotten where I left my phone. And when I found it, it was dead and then I didn’t know where my charger was, and you get the rest of it.”

Scott laughs. “None of that sounds surprising at all. I’m glad to hear you’re okay, man.”

“Yeah, me too.” Stiles smiles. “So, what are you doing tonight?”

“Oh, I‘m busy, I’ve got a-” Scott’s voice stocks. “Actually, uh… Yeah, turns out I’m free today. Why, do you wanna hang out?”

“No. You’re going out with Allison.”

There’s silence on the line for a second. “How did you know?”

“I’ve seen you looking at her. And sometimes you mention her and you get all smiley and gooey-eyed. And you’re always super busy these days.”

Scott clears his throat. “Sorry I didn’t tell you. I just wasn’t sure how… Well, anyway, it doesn’t matter now. We’re not together anymore.”

“Why not?” Stiles should be a goddamn actor, he’s killing it.

Scott sighs. “We had a big fight about… It doesn’t matter what about. Point is, she broke up with me.”

“How long have you been together?”

“A couple months,” Scott says. 

“Listen, Scott,” Stiles starts. “I like Allison. I know I’ve been talking a lot of shit about your friends and the team and all of them; but I realized I was just talking shit  _ to talk shit _ , you know? I don’t really know anything about them. I think you should call her and ask for another chance.”

“You think so?”

“Yeah, dude.”

“Alright, maybe I will.”

“Do it right now.”

“What?”

“Before you lose your nerve and talk yourself out of it. Call her now. Ask her to the dance.”

“Okay, yeah,” Stiles can hear the grin in Scott’s voice, “I’ll call her right now!”

“Good luck, man. I’ll see you on Monday!”

“Bye, Stiles!”

-

Stiles spends the rest of the day playing games and watching videos, because while the week was full of revelations; Stiles was bored out of his fucking mind for the most part.

When his dad comes home the next day, they clean up the house -  the mess Stiles only made to convince his dad - and go out to dinner to celebrate his return. It’s delicious, and way too much, but Stiles eats it all because it’s  _ real food _ and he’s  _ hungry  _ and he’ll never take his food for granted  _ ever again _ .

-

On Monday morning, Stiles decides to be brave and wears the black skinny ripped jeans that have been hanging out in his closet unused ever since he bought them three months ago.

It occurs to him, as he’s walking from his car towards the school entrance, that it’s the middle of December and it’s actually kind of cold out, but still,  _ he’s being brave _ .

When he sees Scott and Allison hanging out at Scott’s locker Stiles waves and smiles before he heads to the principal’s office to explain his absence all week. A note from his dad along with his well-practiced lie about being sick is all it takes, and as soon as he assures the principal he’ll catch up on all the classes he missed, he’s released and he runs to his art class.

Mr. Yee accepts his note for being late and explains today’s assignment. “You’re doing charcoal facial portraits of one of your classmates. Try not to take your charcoal off the paper. Everybody’s paired up already, so you can work with Derek.”

Derek gives a little wave from where he’s sitting and smiles when Stiles joins him.

Stiles takes his charcoal out of the box and opens up his sketchpad. Now he has to draw Derek.

_ i’ve seen you naked. i’ve seen how you look in the mirror like you hate yourself. i’ve seen you help your friends. i’m so into you. probably more than i was before. _

Derek is going to be drawing him. Derek is going to be looking at him for half an hour. How does Derek see him? 

_ how will derek draw me? _

The first part of his drawing is done without looking up. It’s engraved in his brain, the way Derek looks, but after a few awkward minutes, Stiles looks up and stares at him. He’s beautiful. He’s Derek. And he’s looking down at his paper like he’s both shy and afraid to look at Stiles at the same time. And Stiles decides he’ll draw Derek the way he sees him, to try and convince Derek that what he sees in the mirror isn’t what everybody else sees. He drags and he smudges and blends and draws harsh lines and he works hard to show exactly how he feels.

When the half hour is over, Mr. Yee tells everyone to put their charcoal down and start moving around to check other people’s work. When Stiles looks up from his own drawing, Derek is looking right at him. Like he sees him, like he knows him. 

Stiles forces himself to take his time to look at the other drawings before finally checking out what Derek drew.

It’s...beautiful. Which is a weird thing to say about your own face. Derek usually draws people ultra-realistically. Pimples and scars and crooked teeth. But Derek drew Stiles in a way that looks like he doesn’t have imperfections. The drawing has his moles, and the darker splotches he gets when he’s nervous, but they don’t look like they’re a bad thing.

If Stiles would look at the picture - not knowing who the boy was - he’d think the boy was attractive. And that the artist thought he was too.

-

A few hours later Derek sits next to him during English Lit. It baffles Stiles again, just how wrong he was thinking Derek was this confident guy who could get anything and anyone he wanted with the blink of an eye. Stiles feels like an idiot for not seeing how shy he actually is, and how some things seem small to Stiles, but are probably a huge deal to Derek. 

He ignores his own pencil case in his bag and steals a pen out of Derek’s.

“Can I use this?” he whispers, leaning into Derek and laying his hand on Derek’s arm.

“Go ahead,” Derek whispers back.

Stiles grabs his notebook, rips out a page and draws a fly, then passes it to Derek.

Derek smirks and writes underneath. ‘ _ that’s how i look when i just wake up _ ’

Stiles snorts and writes  _ ‘same’ _ . Then he takes another chance, and whispers, “I’m sure you look gorgeous.”

Derek blushes and smiles, and looks down at his paper like he’s concentrating really hard.

After class, Derek is getting ready to leave, and Stiles is panicking.

_ okay. you can do this. you should do this. shit he’s leaving, come on! _

“Wait, Derek!” He stops him in the hallway.

“Yeah?” 

People are walking in the hallway, getting to their next class or to practice, or to gym; but Derek is looking at him like he’s all that matters right now.

“Do you wanna go to a movie on Friday?” Stiles rushes out the words. “We could grab a pizza, I know a great place on Fifth, and then head out to the movie theater?”

Derek looks surprised, but Stiles can’t read anything else on his face.

_ is it a good surprised? a bad surprised? a shocked and appalled? _

“What’s playing?” he asks.

_ shit. fucking shit. balls. what is playing. _

Stiles panics before taking a deep breath and saying, “I don’t care. I just want to see it with you.”

Then Derek grabs his hand and pulls him into a supply closet, and they bump into a shelf, and toilet paper is falling around their heads, and they’re laughing. Derek cups Stiles’ cheek, leans in and presses his lips against Stiles’ own. His lips are dry and warm, and Derek moves away for a second to lick them before Stiles puts his hand on Derek’s neck to pull him closer. This time he kisses Derek, and licks his lips, and can’t help but smile when Derek opens them in surprise. Then they’re both smiling, and they can’t kiss anymore and they just laugh and lean into each other.

“I thought you’d never ask,” Derek says.

“Me neither,” Stiles admits.

“I’m glad you did,” Derek says, and he kisses him again. The bell rings, but they stay there until they’re out of breath, with spit-slick lips and uncomfortably tight pants they’re too shy to acknowledge.


	4. Epilogue

After Stiles’ dad takes an embarrassing amount of pictures of him and and Derek standing next to the christmas tree in their tuxedos, they finally drive over to the school for the Winter Formal. Derek picked him up in his Camaro, and Stiles only closed his mouth when Derek stepped closer and kissed him. 

The Beacon Hills High School sign is covered with streamers and balloons, and the gym has been transformed into a winter wonderland. As far as a high school gym is capable of doing that, of course. 

Stiles spots Scott and Allison dancing and waves to them, but he leaves them to it. They agreed that tonight they’d be focussing on their dates, and wait until the weekend to gossip  about it. Instead, Derek takes his hand and they walk over to a table where Jackson, Boyd, Erica and Isaac are sitting.

Stiles smiles shyly when they join them, and after a quick greeting, Boyd and Erica move to the dance floor. It hasn’t been easy, but Stiles is trying his best to become friends with everyone, and though they were surprised at first, they easily accepted him into their friend group. Being Derek’s boyfriend (Stiles still giggles internally) certainly helped too.

“Stiles.” Derek nudges his shoulder. “Do you want to dance? With me, obviously.”

Stiles pouts. “You know I’m shit at dancing. You said you weren’t gonna embarrass me.”

“I’m not,” Derek promises.

“What do you think this moment qualifies as, Derek?”

“I promise, I won’t embarrass you.” Derek smiles and nudges him again. “Please?”

“Ugh, fine.” Stiles can’t help but grin as they make their way over to join all the other dancing couples. “If you break a toe because I stepped on it, it’s gonna be your fault, I hope you understand that.”

“I’ll gladly take a broken toe, Stiles,” Derek laughs.

Stiles puts his head on Derek’s shoulder and whispers in his ear. “You only say that because you can heal it right away.”

“Well yeah, I might as well use the powers I have.” Derek kisses behind Stiles’ ear. “Especially if it means I can dance with my boyfriend.”

Stiles grins against Derek’s shoulder. “I love it when you say that.”

“What,  _ boyfriend _ ? You’re my  _ boyfriend _ ? Do you like it when I call you my  _ boyfriend _ ?”

“Yes,  _ yes _ , you sappy idiot. Now stop, you’ll make me barf up butterflies.”

“Thanks for those amazing visuals.”

“You’re very welcome.”

-

It’s a little later, and the party seems to be winding down. Isaac is at a table with Scott and Allison, Stiles lost track of where Jackson, Danny  _ or  _ Ethan went about an hour ago and Stiles and Derek decide to go home. To Derek’s home. Because Stiles is going to sleep over. At Derek’s home. In Derek’s room. With Derek. In Derek’s bed.

Stiles is mostly silent on the drive over, and he knows Derek has been throwing him worried glances.

_ oh shit, he can smell my nerves. this werewolf thing is only biting me in the ass. heh. biting my ass. wait, no, focus! _

“Stiles?” Derek asks when they stop at a red light. “Why are you nervous?”

“I’m not,” Stiles squeaks.

“You know my parents are gonna be asleep when we get there, right? And I asked my sisters to leave us alone, too.”

“I know.”

When they get to the Hale house, Derek takes him over to the kitchen for a glass of water. They lose track of time cuddling and kissing against the counter, but eventually make their way to Derek’s room.

Derek takes off his tie and turns to Stiles with a smirk on his face. “I can finally show you my surprise!”

As soon as Stiles looks his way, Derek rips his white dress shirt open dramatically, and reveals the blue  _ superman  _ t-shirt underneath. 

“Oh my fucking god!” Stiles shrieks, then slaps his hands in front of his mouth because  _ people are sleeping _ . He runs the short distance between him and Derek and grabs his face to kiss him stupid. “I love y-it!”

Derek moves his head back. “Did you just say ‘I love yit’?”

Stiles blushes at what almost came out of his mouth. “Yes, shut up.”

“Shutting up now,” Derek grins and kisses Stiles, eventually licking his lips, asking to be let in. Stiles opens up and starts teasing Derek’s tongue with his own, and they fall back on top of Derek’s bed.

Derek is leaning over Stiles’ body, trailing tiny pecks all over his jaw, his chin, his neck and further down his opened shirt.

“Is it any sex stuff you’re nervous about? Because you know we’ll only do what we’re both comfortable with, right?” Derek asks, caressing Stiles’ jaw with his thumb.

“No, I know,” Stiles reassures him. “That’s not it. I mean, there’s nothing. I’m not nervous.”

“Right.” Derek smiles kindly. “Can’t smell a thing in here.”

“What, not even arousal?” Stiles pushes his hips up into Derek’s own.

“I can smell that on you every day, that’s nothing new.” Derek grins.

“Stop teasing me.”

“Alright, I’ll shut up.”

Stiles slaps him playfully. “Not your words, stupid, stop moving your dick away from mine.”

“Ohhhh! That’s what you mean!” Derek lays on top of Stiles and moves their groins together, and Stiles bites his lip to stop the high-pitched squeak from coming out.

“Is that better?”

“I hate you.”

“No, you don’t.”

“No, I don’t. Come here.” Stiles pulls Derek’s face down so he can lick inside his mouth.

“Shirt on or off?” Stiles asks, awkwardly taking off his own dress shirt.

“On, can I open your pants?”

“I’ll be very upset if you don’t. So will my dad when he does the laundry.”

“Awkward time to mention your-”

“Yes, I know, we’re both ignoring I even said that.”

Derek opens Stiles’ pants and slides them - along with his underwear - down to his thighs, then does the same with his own, allowing their hard cocks to touch skin to skin.

“Fuck,” Stiles moans. “I’ve missed this.”

“It’s been, like, three days.” Derek says with a husky voice.

“It’s not the same when I do it by myself.” Stiles huffs. “Come on, you set the pace.”

Derek wraps his warm hand around them both and uses their precome to smoothly move up and down. Stiles works his hands into Derek’s hair and whispers encouragements while Derek jerks them off.

Derek is breathing heavily into Stiles’ neck while Stiles arches off the mattress. “I’m so close, are you close?”

“ _ Fuck _ , yeah, Stiles.” Derek’s hand start moving faster and as Stiles feels the release coming, he pulls Derek’s face close so he can kiss him as he comes.

Derek keeps jerking them until he comes all over Stiles’ stomach, then continues at a slower pace to let them both calm down from the rush. Derek drops down onto the bed next to Stiles and throws a leg over his.

After a while, he runs off to the bathroom and comes back with a damp towel. Derek - now wearing pajamas - cleans Stiles’ stomach and grabs some pajamas for him, and when they’re both dressed, they settle back into bed.

They’re on their sides facing each other, and Derek drags him closer to cuddle.

“Are you gonna tell me why you’re still nervous?” he whispers. It always seems nicer to whisper in the dark.

“You’re gonna laugh.” Stiles whispers back.

“I won’t. I promise, if I laugh, you can tickle me without warning, anytime in the upcoming week.” Derek nods solemnly. “I just want you to be comfortable.”

Stiles kisses Derek’s chin. “I uh… Icantsleepwithoutmypillow,” he rushes out the words.

“I’m sorry, what was that?”

“I can’t sleep,” Stiles sighs, “without my pillow.”

Stiles can see the corner of Derek’s mouth lifting. “Aw, babe.”

“No mocking me.”

“I’m not mocking you, I promise.” Derek kisses him. “How about this? You rest your head on my arm, and next time you sleep over, we’ll make sure to bring your pillow.”

Stiles grins. “Well, I can’t say I’m opposed to that idea.”

Derek settles into his pillow and Stiles lays his head down on his arm after a kiss goodnight.

“I hope dinner goes well tomorrow,” he whispers.

“I’m sure my family’s gonna love you, Stiles.”

Derek kisses Stiles’ forehead.

“Merry Christmas, Derek.”

“Merry Christmas, Stiles.


End file.
